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First day - One of my clownfish is very aggressive

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clown fish
762 views 2 replies 3 participants last post by  blazend 
#1 ·
Hey everyone, first time saltwater tank owner here -

Just had a 100-gallon tank put in my house, and today added fish to it for the first time. Starting with 4 ocellaris clownfish, 2 brown 2 orange, pretty juvenile (less than an inch long).

One of the orange clownfish is very aggressive toward the other orange one (only him). Basically anytime he comes within a few inches of it he'll peck at it and scare it away. The two browns are extremely peaceful.

Should I be worried? If it continues will I need to swap out one of the oranges?

Thanks in advance.
 
#2 ·
Hello! Welcome to TRT!

Aggression with clown fish is perfectly normal when they are first introduced with each other. I don't know if you know this, but all clown fish start off as being males, and schools of them will fight with each other until a dominant male arises, then that dominant male will become the schools breeding female, and the second dominant male will become the primary breeding male, then all the rest just go about their business. If the dominant female dies, the dominant male turns to the female, and so on. The females will also grow considerably larger than the males.

So right now your clowns are probably seeing who is going to be who in their relationship haha!

One thing to note, If you have had paired clowns for a few months and one of them dies, be sure your replacement is SMALLER than the one currently in your tank. One thing you don't want to have is 2 females fighting for territory in your tank, so buying a smaller clown is usually a good rule of thumb to make sure it is a male, and will either mate with the female in your tank, or go through the cycle with your other male.

Happy Reefing!
 
#3 ·
Great info above^. 100% spot on they are trying to figure out who the dominate one is (female).

I added 2 clowns in my small 20 gallon. 1 midnight and 1 OC. About the same size. within the first week the orange looks slightly bigger then the black. The orange bites at the black and he kinda does this little spaz dance.

I believe that is a sign he is the less of the dominate fish. Making the black the male.
 
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